Advise on buying my 1st robotic welder.

[nvlong4n1]

We manufacture attachment for tractor loaders and skid steers. Our items are 4n1 buckets, grapples, root rake brush grapples, tooth bars, fork attachments, etc. All our welding is by hand with wire welders. The fixtures we use to build our products are NOT precision and they work great for us. I have started researching robotic welding and have talked with a few salesmen. The benefits are attractive to us, however I want to make sure that I understand the potential concerns, for example fixturing cost, consummable cost, how often do the robots crash, etc. Are there particular parts that fail often, do power outages cause damage, etc. Any advise is appreciated.

Thanks,

Nelson
you can see the type of products we make at

http://www.wrlonginc.com

 

[FnArObOtGuY]

go to

http://valentinerobotics.com

~~~ FnA Robot Guy
(Fanuc and Abb robot Guru)

 

[ScottTheEngineer]

We use motoman NX100 mig welding bots. 3 robots to a teach pendant and motoman makes arc welding cells that are pretty good.
I've been pretty impressed so far.

 

[roboman100]

Motoman's are not the best robot on the Market. They can be cost effective but are by far not the most user freindly. I have intigrated over 100 robots ranging from Motoman, Staubli, Fanuc, ABB, etc..... For your application and good results. Do not go for price alone. You don't need any fancy pulse eqipment...save money get a miller CV 300 amp welder... don't let the salesman sell you bells and whistles for 5 times the price of what you will actually use. Also, ABB is about the best robot on the market and cost represents it as well. But advantages...you can make a weld schedule that is easily changed and kept seperate from you robot points that allows for easy testing to get the proper parameters. This is going to be different that hand welding....go to

http://www.weldreality.com

The father of modern welding and robotic welding....one of the best sites available.